for all those at home who want to see republicans and democrats work together to avoid the fiscal cliff, we can bring you two lawmakers who are open to cutting a deal before the end of the year. with me are members from both sides of the aisle, u.s. congressman lee terry, a republican from nebraska, and u.s. congressman jerry connolly, a democrat from nearby southern virginia. but first, i want to start with you. you told the "omaha world herald" this about republicans, we're screwed either way. we have no leverage in these discussions. congressman, what did you mean by that? >> what i mean by that is that the president wants us to take a tax vote before he's willing to talk about anything else cutting or reforming, and republicans just aren't going to do that. so what he's doing is setting us up to be the fall people for going over the fiscal cliff. frankly, going over the fiscal cliff is a win for the president. so either way we're going to get it. >> but i don't see why that's true because -- first of all, the president has talked around what kind of cuts he wants to do in nondefense